Law

"The great tides and currents which engulf the rest of men do not turn aside in their course and pass the judges by."

"There is in each of us a stream of tendency, whether you choose to call it philosophy or not, which gives coherence and direction to thought and action. Judges cannot escape that current any more than other mortals. All their lives, forces which they do not recognize and cannot name, have been tugging at them — inherited instincts, traditional beliefs, acquired convictions; and the resultant is an outlook on life, a conception of social needs. … In this mental background every problem finds it setting. We may try to see things as objectively as we please. None the less, we can never see them with any eyes except our own."

"I will always shake hands with a man who offers it to me."

"It is the Judges (as we have seen) that make the common law:— Do you know how they make it? Just as a man makes laws for his dog. When your dog does anything you want to break him of, you wait till he does it, and then beat him for it. This is the way you make laws for your dog: and this is the way the Judges make laws for you and me."

"Non est interpretatio, sed divinatio, quae recedit a litera."

"Judges must beware of hard constructions and strained inferences; for there is no worse torture than the torture of laws. Specially in case of laws penal, they ought to have care that that which was meant for terror be not tuned into rigour; and that they bring not upon the people that shower whereof the Scripture speaketh, Pluet super eos laqueos: for penal laws pressed are a shower of snares upon the people."

"Judges ought to be more learned than witty, more reverend than plausible, and more advised than confident. Above all things, integrity is their portion and proper virtue."

"Judges ought to remember that their office is jus dicere, and not jus dare—to interpret law, and not to make law, or give law."

"It is very disturbing that the integrity of judgements coming from our courts is being openly questioned. More worrying is that in Nigeria today, neither those who cast the ballots nor those who count them decide the outcome of a democratic process. The decision as to who represents the people is now with Judges. [...] If this democracy is to survive, it is imperative that the judiciary as an institution and judges as individuals are not only impartial to those who appear before them but also that the wider public have the confidence that cases affecting their well-being will be decided fairly and in accordance with the law."

"Evidence of concessions made for the purpose of settling matters in dispute, I shall never admit; but facts admitted before arbitrators I always shall."

"Testis oculatus unus plus valet quam auriti decem: One eye-witness is worth more than ten ear-witnesses."

"Concessions made for the purpose of settling the business for which the action is brought, cannot be given in evidence; but facts admitted I have always received."

"Hearsay evidence is always to be received with caution."

"The statement of a living man is not to be disbelieved because there is no corroboration, although in the necessary absence through death of one of the parties to the transaction it is natural that, in considering the statement of the survivor, we should look for corroboration in support of it; but, if the evidence given by the living man brings conviction to the tribunal which has to try the question, then there is no rule of law which prevents that conviction being acted upon."

"Do you imagine that the law supposed that anybody should produce four score witnesses? Two witnesses are enough to prove any fact, if it be a good one, for by the mouth of two witnesses shall a thing be established; and 200 will not prove any fact, if it be a bad one."

"We are obliged to hear all that witnesses have to say; but it is a canticle of Courts of justice that witnesses non numerentur sed ponderentur: they are not to be numbered but weighed. It is the nature of the human mind, it is the perfection of the human heart, to serve a friend in distress; but in doing so, a man should not transgress the higher calls of religion and morality, the obligations of an oath. We are not monks and recluses, as was said in another place,1 but come from a class in society that I hope and believe gives us opportunities of seeing as much of the world, and that has as much virtue amongst its members as any other, however elevated."

"I think it is impossible to give credit to testimony that would prove infinitely more than can be brought within the bounds of probability."

"Artificial rules upon matters of evidence are better avoided as far as possible."

"I think that the situation in which this witness stands towards either party, does not give the party calling the witness a right to cross-examine her, unless her evidence was of itself of such a nature as to make it appear that she was an unwilling witness."

"A hostile witness is a witness who, from the manner in which he gives his evidence, shows that he is not desirous of telling the truth to the Court."

"I can only recommend to you not to break in upon parts of the evidence."

"I think that reading parts of evidence given in a former case is not a legal course."

"There are hundreds of actions tried every year in which the evidence is irreconcilably conflicting, and must be on one side or other wilfully and corruptly perjured."

"It appears to us contrary to all rules of evidence, and opposed to natural justice, that the evidence of one party should be received as evidence against another party, without the latter having an opportunity of testing its truthfulness by cross-examination."

"A general fishing cross-examination ought not to be permitted."

"Try if you can trap him in any question."

"I apprehend that you may put a leading question to an unwilling witness on the examination in chief at the discretion of the Judge; but you may always put a leading question in cross-examination, whether a witness be unwilling or not."

"There are cases where examinations are admitted, namely, before the coroner, and before magistrates in cases of felony. That appears to me to go rather in support of the general rule than in destruction of it. Every exception that can be accounted for is so much a confirmation of the rule that it has become a maxim, Exceptio probat regulam."

"I mean to decide this, and no further. That in each particular case there must be some discretion in the presiding Judge, as to the mode in which the examination shall be conducted, in order best to answer the purposes of justice."

"The objection in principle applies only to those cases where the question propounded involves an answer immediately concluding the merits of the case, and indicating to the witness an answer which will best accord with the interests of the party."

"The wisdom and goodness of our law appear in nothing more remarkably, than in the perspicuity, certainty, and clearness of the evidence it requires to fix a crime upon any man, whereby his life, his liberty, or his property may be concerned : herein we glory and pride ourselves, and are justly the envy of all our neighbour nations. Our law, in such cases, requires evidence so clear and convincing, that every by-stander, the instant he hears it, must be fully satisfied of the truth of it; it admits of no surmises, innuendos, forced consequences, or harsh constructions, nor anything else to be offered as evidence, but what is real and substantial, according to the rules of natural justice and equity."

"There is no fixed rule which binds the counsel calling a witness to a particular mode of examining him. If a witness, by his conduct in the box, shows himself decidedly adverse, it is always in the discretion of the Judge to allow a cross-examination."

"The discretion of a Judge is the law of tyrants: it is always unknown. It is different in different men. It is casual, and depends upon constitution, temper, passion. In the best it is oftentimes caprice; in the worst it is every vice, folly, and passion to which human nature is liable."

"You must answer any questions that are not ensnaring questions."

"I wish that objections to questions as leading, might be a little better considered before they are made. It is necessary, to a certain extent, to lead the mind of the witness to the subject of inquiry. If questions are asked, to which the answer "Yes" or "No" would be conclusive, they would certainly be objectionable, but in general no objections are more frivolous than those which are made to questions as leading ones."

"Circumstantial evidence only raises a probability."

"It is the duty of the Judge in criminal trials to take care that the verdict of the jury is not founded upon any evidence except that which the law allows."

"Certainly, no evidence will be received but what is legal evidence— at least, none but what the Judge thinks is legal; you may take that for granted."

".... A good corroborating chain, if they fail in the last link, the whole will fall to the ground."

"Suspecting is not believing; saying he suspects would not be well; but swearing according to his estimation is sufficient."

"A fair suspicion may be well worthy of further investigation, and it may well be worth the expense and trouble of examining witnesses to see whether it is well founded."

"I cannot go upon suspicion; I can only look at the evidence."

"To my mind the taking some expression of a Judge used in deciding a question of fact as to his own view of some one fact being material on a particular occasion, as laying down a rule of conduct for other Judges in considering a similar state of facts in another case, is a false mode of treating authority. It appears to me that the view of a learned Judge in a particular case as to the value of a particular piece of evidence is of no use to other Judges who have to determine a similar question of fact in other cases where there may be many different circumstances to be taken into consideration."

"It is difficult to say what is or is not evidence in itself, because it all depends upon the chain and connection it has—if there are two or three links in the chain, they must go to one first and then to another, and see whether they amount to evidence."

"Some instances of strength of memory are very surprising."

"The witness swears more generally on his senses, the juror by collection and inference, by the act and force of his understanding."

"Sitting in a Court of law, I can receive no evidence but what comes under the sanction of an oath."

"There is no difference, in point of evidence, whether the case be a criminal or civil case; the same rules must apply to both."

"Cotton Mather never in any public writing 'denounced the admission' of it, never advised its absolute exclusion; but on the contrary recognized it as a ground of 'presumption' ... [and once admitted] nothing could stand against it. Character, reason, common sense, were swept away."

"Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence."